Back to the USSR: How Colors Might Shape the Political Perception of East versus West

Abstract

People typically process information to confirm their prior held attitudes and stereotypes. As the political relations between NATO and Russia have distinctively drifted apart in recent years, we were interested in how far old-established color depictions referring to the Cold War’s demarcations (USSR = red; NATO = blue) might reinforce people’s political perception of an East versus West antagonism nowadays. Participants received a fabricated news article in which both world powers were either depicted on a map as Russia = red and NATO = blue or vice versa (Study 1). Testing a different sample in Study 2, we fully removed color assignments and used hachured distinctions or no distinctions at all. We revealed that perceived political distance between both sides increased particularly for participants with negative attitudes toward Russia, but only when Russia was depicted in red. Thus, colors referring to the old-established Cold War patterns can indeed shape the political perception and reinforce stereotypical East versus West thinking.

Color War. Does Color Influence the Perception of Political Messages?

“…As in previous research (Gebauer et al, 2016; Palmer & Schloss, 2010; Schloss et al, 2011), political colors have shown their ability to produce consistent behavior. But they have only succeeded in scenarios of uncertainty.…”

“…Therefore, colors could be a valuable source of knowledge (Graber et al, 2001; Lavin & Lawless, 1998; Shankar et al, 2009) about our political environment. They would be able to activate prior stereotypes (Burkitt et al, 2007; Gebauer et al, 2016; Palmer & Schloss, 2010), and partisan biases that, as shown in several previous researches (Carver, 2001; Lodge & Taber, 2000; Simon et al, 2004; Taber & Lodge, 2006; Westen et al, 2006), and can modify the political behavior of citizens.…”

“…The importance of colors in politics stems from their ability to activate prior stereotypes (Burkitt et al, 2007; Gebauer et al, 2016; Palmer & Schloss, 2010). This is because, as with other political objects, color provides information to the receiver of a message.…”

“…This information can be very obvious, such as allowing us to classify a state as Democratic or Republican based on the color with which it has been represented on a map (Burriss & McComb, 2001; Rutchick et al, 2009), or operate at a more complex, but equally effective, level of processing. For example, we can modify the opinion about Russia in the readers of a news article if we recreate the colors that were used to represent the Cold War blocs (Gebauer et al, 2016). That is, negative stereotypes can be activated through the association of, for example, the color red to a country.…”

Laocoonte. Número 9

“…Este efecto ha sido ampliamente investigado (cf. Gebauer, Raab, Carbon 2016). Con el acto icónico, estos mecanismos, que parten de la psicología y del encaje social de los receptores, se amplían ahora hasta el punto de que las imágenes se entienden como una fuente de estímulo pseudoviviente que provoca una interacción configurada sistemáticamente: el «acto icónico» supone una interacción entre la imagen y el espectador en la que un impulso esencial emana de la contraparte del receptor.…”